


Taking The Long Way Home

by lostinthesounds



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Bellarke, F/M, Fluff, I'm so sorry that madi is finn's child in this but it's for plot reasons, Love Confessions, Protective!Bellamy, echo is some rich english transfer student at oxford, finn gives clarke the worst first time, gina is only mentioned briefly, have I mentioned slow burn?, jealous!Clarke, lemme figure some things out, love rosie is iconic don't fight me, might show up in future chapters, raven and clarke are best friends, she ends up pregnant, slowburn, unknown update pattern
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-28
Updated: 2020-04-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:26:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23516890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostinthesounds/pseuds/lostinthesounds
Summary: (A Love, Rosie BellarkeAU)Bellamy and Clarke have been best friends for the past twelve years, and they think nothing would tear them apart after their high school graduation. It wasn't long until Bellamy got his acceptance letter to attend a creative writing summer program at Oxford, and Clarke goes through the aftermath of her night with Finn Collins. Their lives changed forever after that summer, and this is a story in which they find their way back to each other.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin, Bellamy Blake/Gina Martin, Minor Bellamy Blake/Echo - Relationship, Minor Clarke Griffin/Finn Collins
Comments: 4
Kudos: 28





	Taking The Long Way Home

**Author's Note:**

> The start of something new? Please feel free to bother me to update, I've loved this idea for months! The second chapter is almost done, but I won't be posting for a few days, feel free to comment or leave kudos! Stay safe everyone <3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A party on the beach, a disastrous night at Prom for Clarke, and graduation. 
> 
> Why is Clarke getting sick so much? Why is Bellamy leaving?

* * *

* * *

_**June 14 2013** _

Bellamy Blake was her best friend. He’s been by her side since they were five years old, and as she watches him stare wide-eyed at his high school crush of two years named Gina when she gives a cheap excuse to missing their tutoring session today--she knows she shouldn’t feel anything that resembled envy or jealousy on her part. As the best friend to the cutest boy in their entire grade, (she always knew girls liked Bellamy’s type, smart and shy) she should be encouraging him to get out of his comfort zone and go after Gina. 

  
  


She should feel like punching him in the shoulder and congratulating him on scoring someone as pretty and curvy as Gina Martin, or be seconds away from pushing him off the wooden log into the sand when she starts talking and he’s still staring at the brunette as she walks away. But, she couldn’t do any of that. All she could do is let him have what he wanted without being an ass about it. 

  
  


“If you wanna go to the dance with her,” Clarke begins, bringing her knees to her chest to maintain some sort of warmth in the summer breeze with the sun setting in front of her. She tugs at the material of her denim shorts, a nervous habit she picked up on early in life. Bellamy breaks out of his trance, looking at her while she speaks. “You could take her instead.” 

  
  


“Then you’d have nobody to go with,” Bellamy shook his head. He was always so nice and considerate, and she adored him for that. With his glasses perched on his nose, eyes big and soft, she knew he would be good for anyone who truly wanted him. “I thought we were going to have one last night to remember high school, and it’s prom, Clarke. I wanted to go with you.” He spoke with such a purpose, like Prom was the last time they'd ever get to spend time with each other. She doesn't want to think about that right now. 

  
  


Clarke twirls a piece of her blonde hair behind her ear, a long piece that kept blowing in her face when it finally fell free of her braid. She stares at him, smiling. “You have Gina to go with now, and from the way she was looking at you tonight, she wants _you_ to ask her.” She pauses when he inhales sharply from the surprise of the truth, and shrugs her shoulders. Trying to be okay with it all, she keeps his intense gaze because she wants him to be happy. “Let this be our last night to remember, it’s fine with me.” 

  
  


Bellamy sighs, taking one last look at Gina as he scoots closer to Clarke until their knees are touching. 

  
  


“Do you really think she’s into me?” 

  
  
  


“She likes the nerdy guys, I told you that before.” 

  
  


“ _Hey_ .” Bellamy takes offense to that, laughing as he nudges Clarke’s knee with the back of his hand. It’s times like these where she takes time to admire him when he’s not looking, and she loses her breath. The flannel he was wearing was a mix of red and black, the sleeves cuffed to his elbow with a plain tank top underneath to show off his muscles. (He started working out the summer before junior year, and he would always come to her house after his sessions and say “ _It’s to make myself feel good, and definitely not to impress Gina_ ”) And he’s kept the charade up ever since, even after she rejected him the first time. 

  
  


His denim shorts ended slightly above the knee, so they were touching skin to skin when he sat next to her and she didn’t think much of it. At this point in their lives, she’s seen him naked more than a handful of times. That wasn’t the problem, not when she couldn’t stop thinking about him lately. 

  
  


But, as she embraces the minimum contact between them in a group of senior classmen from their school in the middle of a beach bonfire--she convinces herself they couldn’t be anything more than friends. 

  
  


Bellamy clears his throat, “Are you sure you won’t mind if i ask her to prom? I could try and get Miller to help you out with a date, or you could even come with us if you want.” 

  
  


“I don’t want to be a third wheel,” Clarke clarified, staring into the smoke of the fire. She doesn’t look at him yet, afraid of her own heart. “And I already have someone in mind.” 

  
  


“Who?” 

  
  


Clarke gestured to the boy in the middle of the crowd on the other side of the bonfire, who’s shirtless with a ridiculous grin on his face as he alternates between talking to two girls in bikinis beside him. 

  
  


Bellamy rubs his hand down his face, “Please don’t tell me you’re going to ask him.” 

  
  


“I’ve caught him staring before, and although he’s a bad listener when I tell him to get his hand off my thigh during biochem,” Clarke feels heat rise in her cheeks with a blush. “He’s not a bad person.” 

  
  


“He won’t hesitate to try and get you in his bed,” Bellamy warns. 

  
  


“What if I want him to?” She argued back, thinking of the plan she’s had since freshman year. She would tell herself that if she didn’t have a partner by senior year, then she would find someone to take her virginity. It might’ve been cliche to save yourself for Prom night, but she didn’t want to go to college without some sort of experience in that field. Clarke looks at a shocked Bellamy, her head held high. “I’m sure Gina would want the same with you.” 

  
  


Bellamy looked down, silence washing over them for a full minute. 

  
  


“I’m gonna go ask her then,” He finally comes to a conclusion with a huff passing his lips, turning around to face Clarke with a growing smirk as he extends his hand out for her to grab. She knows what he’s going to say before he even opens his mouth, and she just hopes she wouldn’t look like a fool in front of Finn Collins. “And you’re going to ask Finn at the same time.” 

  
  


In the end, Bellamy spends the rest of the party in Gina’s circle of friends with their hands interlocked and her lips peppering his jaw every few minutes. Clarke has Finn’s arm hung around her shoulder, keeping her close as he declines an invitation to play beach volleyball before Clarke has the chance to turn his cheek to meet his lips in a searing kiss that takes his breath away. 

  
  


It’s the same routine like every public outing they go to together. Bellamy drives her home and says goodbye with a kiss on her forehead, he’s been doing it ever since Lexa broke her heart in sophomore year and she wouldn’t stop crying in his car. It was a sense of comfort, a friendly reminder that he’s always there for her. That’s all it was, _friendly_. So when he kisses her forehead with the moonlight reflecting off his dashboard, her own lips are sore from distracting herself with Finn Collins, she can’t stop thinking about Gina’s lips on his. 

  
  


She doesn’t have a problem with this. Not at all. 

* * *

**_June 17th 2013_ **

On the night of the dance, Bellamy is the one knocking on her door past seven--thirty minutes until they both had to be ready to make their way to the venue--panicking because he can’t tie his stupid red tie around his neck. 

  
  


She ushers him to her room with curlers stuck in her hair, a robe hugging her frame tightly with her bunny slippers on as she feels no judgement from her best friend about her attire. He was too busy freaking out over how to impress Gina, but she told him that she liked him enough to say yes to his invitation to Prom. 

He makes a comment telling her how beautiful she looked, curlers and all, and she has to keep busy with his tie to distract herself from the way her heart leaps in her chest. She doesn't think much of it, instead forcing the thought away to the deepest parts of her mind. 

She asks him which dress he liked more, the black one that ended just above her knee with lace running down the sides or the purple that flowed at the waist that showed off her cleavage. She knew she looked good either way, and Finn wouldn't be able to keep her hands off the entire night. A small part of her wanted Finn to take her upstairs right away once they got to the venue, (seriously, who's mistake was it booking Prom at a hotel? It made no sense to her) so that she wouldn't have to see Bellamy and Gina together. 

In the end, Bellamy picks the purple dress with wide eyes.

He tells her, cringing. "Isn't the black one a bit much?" Turning back towards her mirror that hung on her door, he doesn't make eye contact with her anymore. 

Clarke wished he picked the other one, just to excite Finn, but it doesn't surprise her when Bellamy doesn't like it. He was always awkward with situations like these. 

"I'm a girl with a plan, Bell." She says, running to her bathroom across the hall to take her curlers out. She comes back into her room minutes later, after realizing she forgot her dress to put on when she sees Bellamy holding one of her white hangers to put the black dress back in her closet. 

The words get caught in her throat, wondering why he was doing something so simple for her, but he only offers a gentle smile.

She gives him a sideways glance, and decides to forget about whatever _that_ was to grab the purple dress to go finish getting ready. Clarke doesn't realize until she gets home hours later, after a disaster of a night, that the black dress was now stored in the very back of her closet. Out of her reach entirely. He must've known she would forget about it at some point, so he did it for her sake. 

In that moment, she realized why Bellamy did that. It was to protect her for everyone but Finn, she was sure of it. Of course, her best friend would want her to have a good memorable night with someone she wants to be with. (A very small part of her kept fighting the idea that he did it to protect himself from the feelings he has for her. That _somehow_ , he liked her as more than a friend.) 

She shakes it off, and thinks about something else. 

* * *

"Bellamy, please," Clarke wrapped Finn's jacket further around her shoulders, holding the phone to her ear in with shaky fingers. She had left him sleeping in the room to escape, after keeping herself awake with shocking realizations. "I need you to come get me so we could go to the store." 

"Are you okay?" The sound of the music from the dining hall was louder than he must've thought, because she couldn't hear what he says after that. 

"I _need_ to leave," She tries to keep from stuttering, but failing when fear gets the best of her. "I can't explain it now." She pants, her vision blurring with tears. 

"Are you hurt?" 

"No, _god_ , no." Clarke shakes her head, suddenly growing impatient as she pokes her head down each hallway to look for an elevator. She asks him hurriedly, "Where are you?"

"Clarke, you're scaring me," Bellamy yells over the music this time, so she could hear him. Then, she also hears Gina whispering in his ear and she could feel herself shiver in disgust. She sighs in relief once she actually spots an elevator, and runs barefoot on the scratchy carpet of the hotel. 

"I did something terrible," She pushed the button, panting as her heart rate sped up. "I made a mistake." 

"I told you that having sex with Collins was gonna be terrible," Bellamy teased, and she really just wanted to slap him at that point. She hated that he wasn't _wrong_. She hated that Finn didn't even touch her, or take off her dress, or even last more than _two_ minutes in bed. The whole thing was an uncomfortable mess that quite frankly, she never wanted to speak about again.

"He _was_ terrible, Bell." Clarke groaned, rubbing her other hand over her face in shame. "And that's not even the worst part." 

"Please, don't tell me he didn't have--" 

She cuts him off, "It's worse." A slight pause, swallowing down the sudden urge to cry. "More like the condom had been in his wallet for a few months, and the damn thing was broken. It tore while, _you know_ , and when he pulled out, the sheets got ruined."

"Did you--" 

The elevator doors opened, and Clarke wasn't hearing any music on the other line anymore. He must be looking for her, and it suddenly made her so happy to have someone like Bellamy in her life. 

She huffs angrily, "What makes you think I had any fun? Do I seem like someone who had a good night?" 

"It's going to be okay, Clarke," Bellamy soothed, and she hears another door opening on his end of the call. "I know this is stressful, but there's a CVS down the block where you could find one of those morning after pills? That's what they're called right? We could leave once I find you, are you coming to the lobby anytime soon?" 

She nods to an empty space, tears threatening to fall. She felt so stupid, so dumb for thinking she could trust Finn. 

She didn't even want to think of the possibility of....Clarke shakes her head at the thought, giving Bellamy an answer finally. 

"I'm on the elevator down," She croaked, not wanting her emotions to get the best of her. He was just trying to calm her down, and she should be grateful. _She was grateful for him._

"Good," Bellamy said, "I'll wait for you by the front doors." 

Clarke takes a deep breath, her voice barely above a whisper. "Thank you, Bell." 

"Don't freak out, okay?" She swore he's never spoken this gentle in their entire twelve years of knowing each other. It was like he knew exactly what to say, and how to say it, in order to calm her down and trust him with every ounce of her body. "Just breathe, Clarke. It'll be fine and you won't do this alone." 

He spoke with such conviction that she believed him. She believed that it was a promise he was making. 

Bellamy kept his promise, even when Gina stood in shock at the top of the steps of the hotel wondering where her date was going with his best friend _and_ when he didn't look back after making sure Clarke had her seatbelt on in the passenger seat of his car. Clarke ruined his night, and he didn't even seem to mind. 

* * *

**_ June 27th 2013  _ **

They end up graduating high school a week after Prom, and on the night of graduation Clarke stays home after dinner with her parents and Bellamy's family. She said goodbye to him at the door, and her parents were talking in hushed whispers in the living room to avoid waking up their daughter. She knew she at least got seven hours of sleep last night, considering the fact that she's been anxious about graduation and starting college in two months, she would think it was a great night's sleep compared to others. 

The first wave of exhaustion hit her in the afternoon, right after she had walked off stage with her diploma. 

The next hit after dinner, and the thought of sleeping in her own bed and pillows was enough to get her parents to agree to take her home for the night. Octavia, Bellamy's younger sister, was kind enough to let Clarke rest her head on her shoulder as they didn't want to talk in the buzzing conversations of Aurora Blake and her mother about how proud they were of their children for completing such a milestone. 

Clarke would be proud of herself too. If she didn't feel like closing her eyes every five seconds. 

She doesn't go to Bellamy when she wants someone to sleep on in the car ride back to her house, because he would whisper questions in her ear that she wasn't ready to answer. Or confront. 

So she settles for rubbing her thumb over the back of his hand when she exits the car, pulling him close and whispering something that he wouldn't ever doubt. 

"I'm so happy for you, Bell." He hides his face in her shoulder, a smile growing wide on both of their lips. "I'm proud of you, and I know it wasn't easy keeping up with me for the past four years--" 

He cuts her off with a loud sigh, laughing. "You say it like it's been a challenge?"

Clarke doesn't respond, but she holds her breath when his hand tightens on her waist. She could feel the weight of his grip against the thick sparkly band of her white dress, and she can't stop smiling. Her mother calls out for her, and her eye lids feel as if they'd close any second like she'd fall asleep right in his arms. "I've kept up with you for _twelve_ years, and there's nothing that could bring us down anymore." 

Clarke lets her eyes flutter closed, for only a second. 

"Goodnight." 

"Have a good night." 

She wanted to believe what he was saying, but deep inside, she knew she couldn't. 

* * *

**_July 10th 2013_ **

She was losing her best friend for the first month of summer. It was her fault that she wasn't paying as close attention to detail as she should've, when he told her the first time in the middle of her bedroom after bursting into the room like it was on fire. 

It didn't register until she's done rubbing her eyes of sleep, and Bellamy hasn't stopped pacing back and forth in her bedroom. 

"I didn't think I would get it, I _really--_ " He rambled, losing his breath when he finds himself getting dizzy with joy. When he realizes that Clarke had pulled her blue comforter over her head, he doesn't hesitate in sitting on the edge of her head to yank the covers back with both hands. She groaned at the sunlight in her eyes again, and he continues talking with a smile that could've lit the entire room if the curtains were closed. "I really didn't think I would get in, it's _insane_ to me Clarke." 

"I'm proud of you." She mumbled, bringing her knees to her chest with cautious because she wasn't wearing a bra and her pajama pants were riding up her calves. He was a blurry picture for a second, before she blinks a few more times. An instant warmth fills her entire body when he's beaming up at her, when he's fully dressed in a thin zip-up grey sweater and matching sweatpants and she's trying to hide how much skin she's exposing to him right now. "Now, can you please get out so I can go back to sleep?" 

"It's almost eleven, Clarke." He points out, grabbing her bedside clock to shove in her face playfully. "You never sleep this late." 

"I just had a rough night," She said in a serious tone, thinking back to last night with a shiver down her back. "I had dinner pretty late last night, because my dad got home from the hospital before his shift was supposed to end and I wanted to eat with him." She sits up against the headboard, straightening up. "It was weird to say the least." 

"Weird?" Bellamy tilts his head, "What does weird mean?" 

Clarke shakes her head, which ended up being a bad idea because she instantly rubs at her temples to rid tension building. 

"My dad was fine, Bell." Her eyes close to concentrate on the pain of the headache, and she extends her legs out on the bed to get more relaxed. Bellamy notices, and adjusts his position so that he could pick up her legs and place them in his lap. She could count on her fingers how many times he's done something like that, but she forces the sensation of his touch out of her mind for the time being. She had bigger things to worry about, like why she got sick after just smelling rice out of a Chinese take out box. 

She takes a deep breath, "I just got sick last night, and It wasn't fun." 

Bellamy hums, "Coming from a girl who could practically eat anything without being picky or disgusted, I'd say that is pretty _weird_ for you." 

They stay in silence for a while, in the same position even when Clarke's mother walks into the room to mention the idea of breakfast. With the small crack of smell from the kitchen downstairs, they could both smell pancakes and eggs being made. It smelled delicious to Bellamy, who was eager to go downstairs. 

Clarke barely makes it to the bathroom after untangling herself from Bellamy's embrace, before she drops to her knees and hurls over the toilet with both hands clutching the bottom. 

"Clarke?" He asks in concern from the door, twisting the knob open to peek his head through. "Are you okay?" 

"Yeah, _yeah_ I'm good, Bell." She sits back on her heels, her throat burning with the realization that the headache was dulling down as the smell of her mother's cooking was all that she could focus on; She couldn't force the smell away, and she didn't know what else she could throw up anymore. She looks past the door, to the sight of her mother walking down the stairs. "Can you wait for me downstairs?" 

Bellamy nods slowly, as if he was deciding if he should listen to her or not. _Please, Bellamy_. She pleaded softly, dismissing his concern when she tries to stand on shaky legs and grab a towel to wipe her mouth and soak in water so that she could wipe down her face. 

She hasn't been sleeping well lately. 

One look at the dark circles under her eyes, and it was visible to anyone who cared. 

She's been getting sick more, and before this week, the last time she had to run to the bathroom like this was when she got a stomach bug in her freshman year of high school. The last time she threw up was three years ago, and she was growing more and more confused each day. 

_Blueberry pancakes_ _and scrambled eggs._ Her favorite breakfast, and she couldn't stand the smell. 

* * *


End file.
